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Thursday, April 26, 2012

A Psychological Defense Mechanism: PROJECTION!

Have you ever known a
person who has a strong dislike one of his friends and believes that his friend
hates him instead?

(Well, take your time
and think about this for a while...)

Now the question is:
Have you ever felt this way before?

Ok, no worries... No one
will blame you for what you've felt before; it's just normal. This was only
"Projection" which is one of the defense mechanisms according to the
Freudian Psychoanalitic Theory (an unconscious psychological strategy which
helps us to cope with the reality and maintain self-image)

Today I wanted to write
about this subject as I always found it as one of the most interesting subjects
of Psychology.

"A Psychology degree was
the only thing I have ever wanted to have as it was a perfect fit and very
intellectually fulfilling for me. So, I am so happy I could be able to
achieve one of my biggest goals in my life. However, I must confess that
studying Psychology was quite challenging as it makes you to face the things
inside that you were not aware of before, which have been in the unconscious
part since the very early stage of your life.If you are already a
Psychology student... Welcome to an unusual journey to face the reality which
might be a biting experience will last for a lifetime.. And once you step into
the world of Psychology there's no turning back."

G. Nur Bilek

Let's go back to
understand the nature of our defence mechanisms: A good news is normally a
healty person use different defence mechanisms throughout life. It only becomes
pathological when we use them persistently and our physical and/or mental
health is adversely affected.

So, the question
is: WHY do we use a defense mechanism? Well, the answer is very
simple:

a) According to Freudian
approach we all have Id, Ego and, Superego, the parts
that make up a person's personality. Really, I don't wanna use
psychological jargon when speaking to people who may not be familiar with
psychological terms. So, let me make it clear for you. In a nutshell,

The id seeks to fulfill
all needs and impulses, obeys the pleasure principle: "Pleasure is good
and – nothing else matters" while...

The superego tries
to get the ego to act in an idealistic and moral manner.

And suddenly our ego arises
and tries to cope with the conflicting demands of the id and the superego.

Freud's Iceberg Freud explained these concepts by comparing the human mind to a cleverly illustrated iceberg which has three parts.

Are you curious about
how Freud called these concepts in his own language? Here are the original
versions of the id, ego, and the superego.

Es

The id (in German)

Ich

The ego (in German)

Überich -over
I-

The superego (in
German)

Well, let's try to
understand this. Superego is the component of the personality
composed of our internalized behaviours that we have acquired from our parents and society while id represents
our impulses, a selfish, childish, and pleasure-oriented part of the
personality with no ability to delay gratification. Superego is our moral
standards which tries to suppress the urges of the id and tries to make
the ego behave morally, rahter than realistically. The id is without
values, ethics and logic. Can you imagine the possible
conflicts between the id and the superego?

So, what does ego
do? Ego is the rational part that meditates immediate
impulses of the id and the pressure from the superego. It delays immediate
gratification till an appropriate time.

1. Conscious:
The visible part of the iceberg is the conscious part which is small. This is
the part of the mind that hold what you are aware of.

2. Preconscious:
This is the ordinary memory. Though things stored here aren't in the conscious
they can be readily brought in the conscious.

3. Unconscious: Most
of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as
feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict. According to Freud, the unconscious
continues to influence our behavior and experience, even though we are
unaware of these underlying influences.

b) Ego is the
moderator between the id and superego which seeks compromises to pacify
both. What happens when the ego cannot cope with the demands of the id and
the superego? According to Freud anxiety, an unpleasant inner state that
people avoid, arises and it acts as a signal for us that things are not
going right!

"εγώ"

The word
"Ego" comes from εγώ in Greek which means "I"

So let's go back to the
example of the two friends above. I want to illustriate if for you! (Why I gave
this example is a very close friend of mine is terribly annoyed by her
colleague's (Mrs X) bahaviors towards her. Mrs X have a tendency to wear whatever
my friend wears, and...

Then your superego
says that you have a value, "jealousy" is a "bad",
immature feeling to be resisted.

Your ego tries to cope
with what the id feels and what the superego thinks. If it cannot...
Projection may happen! And you believe that X friend is jealous of you...

What is PROJECTION? If a
person has uncomfortable thoughts or feelings they may project it onto other
people. In other words, projection is attributing your own unacceptable
impulses to someone else. The impulses are still judged unacceptable but
they belong to someone else, not you :)

Well, think about it
again... Have you ever felt this way? No, you didn't? According to Freaudian
Theory you probably did it many times which you have never been aware of as it
happens in the unconscious part of your mind, somewhere deep, very deep and outside
of your awareness...

* Racism is bad,
right? This is what we are taught and socially unacceptable. If you have racist
ideas while believing racism is socially undesirable you may feel that a friend
is racist, projecting your own racism onto the other person.

* Projection can take a
range of forms. Do you wonder how projection influences our decision making or
purchasing decisions? Or it's better to ask "Did you have any difficulty
when shopping for winter clothing in June?" Well, I think I can hear what
you say :) Yes, always! We have a tendency to assume that our mental state
will will remain consistent in the future, even though we are aware of winter
will come soon!

* Psychological
projection can be very important in interpersonal relationships, especially
before attributing thoughts or ideas to someone else. Maybe it's better to try
to analyze our own thoughts and beliefs before attributing a bad thought to
others. Maybe the thoughts we dislike is seen in ourself.

* Do you have
friends who does not trust anyone in his/her life? (Hope this is not a
very close friend or boyfriend/girlfriend or supouse!) It's highly recommended
to be on the safe side. There's a possibility of s/he does trust
himself/herself and all s/he does it attributing what s/he feels to the other
people around.

* An unfaithful
husband may suspect his wife of infidelity.

* A chronically liar
friend may suspect you of lying him/her.

Before judging people's
thought towards us or the world, I think it's better to seek out more reliable
sources on what someone else thinking. I know that's not easy, sometimes seems
impossible, but studying psychology's taught us to trust in psychology science,
hasn't it?

Well, I know I wanna
talk too much when it's psychology as it seems to me an endless ocean and
there's still an ocean left.

Finally, I'd be very
happy if you share your thoughts, ideas and experiences with me!

"We are effectively
cognitive icebergs with most of our 'thoughts' occurring below the water
line."